Meerkat Enrichment Activities
Environmental
- Den
- Elevated walkways
- Logs and dead tree trunk with holes
- Space for digging tunnels
- Sandbox
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Food
- Live insects (grubs, worms, crickets, grasshoppers)
- Dead frogs
- Dead day-old chicks
- Dead mice and unborn rats
- Meat with fur
- Whole gem squash and corn on the cob
- Stuffing meat, raw nuts and fruit in holes and crevices in logs
- Burying meal worms in sandbox
- Feeding meat in box or toilet paper roll
- Scattering fruit around enclosure
- Foraging in other enclosures
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Novel and Sensory
- Small plastic ball with pieces of meat inserted in slot
- Pine cone stuffed with fruit
- Papier-mâché ball with pieces of meat or dry cat food inside
- Fresh parsley and coriander
- Vanilla cologne sprayed on objects in enclosure
- Frozen donkey or horse skin
- Switching enclosures with other animals
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Social
- Interaction with other meerkat
- Interaction with other animals through fence
- Interaction with staff and volunteers
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Exercise
- Walks on harness and lead
- Chasing guinea fowl wing attached to whip
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